The Show
by Redlance-ck
Summary: Undercover reporter, Sam McPherson, wants to crack a story over at the local strip club. Brooke McQueen escorts her. Sam/Brooke


**Disclaimer: **Characters belong to Ryan Murphy, I'm just borrowing them so they can do my bidding for a while.

**Dedication:** For boomwizard. This was started as an apology for my You Found Me fic, and it's just… really, really late. But no less meaningful. I'm sorry I killed Sam. =P

**A/N:** Thanks, as always, to quatorz. As you well know, I couldn't have gotten this finished without you ;). Like, seriously. It would have withered and died and Hannah would have killed me.

**A/N II**: I'm kind of worried that the flow of the story might seem disjointed in spots. Partly because there were such long gaps between writing, partly because bits were written in the wee hours, others were written while I was slightly less disoriented. I feel like the end of this might read rushed, maybe because it was written over a few days as opposed to the rest of it, so I wanted to throw a warning for 'abruptness' out there. Sorry, but if I don't finish it now, I'm scared I never will! Also, not spellchecked. All mistakes are mine. MINE!

* * *

"Tell me again why you insisted on coming with me?" Sam asked, squinting in the glare of the bright red light and shifting against the rough wall she was leaning against. They shuffled forward and she felt her companion grip the back of the jacket she was wearing in order to stay close.

"To make sure you weren't mugged on the way." Brooke told her, eyes on the tall, stocky black man at the door. "And in case someone tries to kidnap and recruit you once you got here. I don't want a crack-whore stripper for a step-sister." Sam looked at Brooke askance.

"Your concern is truly touching." With a roll of her eyes at the blonde's smile, Sam patted the inside pocket of her jacket for the sixth time since they'd left the house. A whine of annoyance left Brooke and her arm shot out, gripping Sam's hand in her own and pulling it down between them.

"Will you stop it? If you keep acting like you're packing heat, Mr T is gonna search you." Sam let out a snort, her gaze moving to the practically gold plated bouncer they were rapidly approaching.

"I pity the fool who tries to rough me up." She said in a low raspy voice and Brooke's grip on Sam's fingers tightened in her effort not to laugh.

"ID?" Mr T was staring at them expectantly as they looked away from each other and towards him. They watched as attention eyes dropped from their faces and it was only when Sam found she had to let go of Brooke's hand in order to reach her wallet that she realised what he was looking at. He met her embarrassed face with a slimy smirk. "You ladies enjoy the show." He stepped aside from and both of them tensed as they felt his eyes rake sleazily over them, making their skin crawl. "Sappho is on tonight, but I'm sure you knew that already." Sam shot Brooke an alarmed look before the blonde took the initiative, and advantage of the fact that the guy wasn't asking them for ID anymore, and grabbed the sleeve of Sam's coat, dragging her through the door.

The room they entered was large, dark and smoky. A long stage, like a glowing white rectangle, was situated against the back wall opposite them. Offshoot stages reached out into the crowd of tables that were littered around in the main area and a pole was fixed at the midway point of each. A bar was to their left, occupants already comfortable on their stools and bartender busy with orders, and whatever was to the right of them was blocked from view by a red curtain. There were various pictures on the walls that showcased the club's many 'stars'. All of them women, all of them very, very nude. The faint sound of cheesy porn music filtered in from unseen speakers making Sam's stomach clench in disdain. She glanced over at Brooke who was surveying their surroundings with a similar wide-eyed curious discomfort.

"Tell me again why I insisted on coming with you?" The taller girl muttered, eyes flitting to their corners to find Sam's. The brunette's lips parted in a wry smile and she moved into the sea of tables.

"You wanted to masquerade as my protector." Sam pulled a chair out from under a table that was in the centre row. All of them were dimly lit by candles in what she assumed was the owner's attempt at classy.

"And somehow ended up as your lesbian life partner." Brooke scoffed, glancing around as she noticed movement on the stage. "Did you see the way that guy was leering at us?" Sam's nose wrinkled as she gave Brooke a shuddering look and nodded.

"But I can guarantee that he probably looks at every woman who comes in here that way." Brooke raised a fair eyebrow.

"Are you saying we don't make a smoking hot couple?" Sam's jaw unhinged and hit the table. Before she could reply, Brooke got to her feet again, smirking. "I'm getting a drink, you want anything?" She held up her purse and shook it, as if trying to entice the other girl.

"Coke?" Brooke's eyebrow twitched a second time, but she said nothing and made her way to the bar. _"Okay. Let's get this thing rolling." _She eyed her surroundings to make sure nobody was watching them and, finally noticing that the girls had made their way onto the stage, realised no one's eyes would be on her tonight. She reached into the inside pocket jacket and brushed her fingers over the reassuring firmness of her trusty Dictaphone. _"The only problem with that being my not knowing where to even begin."_ She let her hand drop and her eyes shift towards the stage. The women had all taken their spots and were busy doing their thing. Seats occupied by exuberant males were placed around the edges of the offshoot stages, allowing the guys to get close enough to the exotic dancers to place those bills right into their g-strings. A quiet grunt of disgust left Sam as she surveyed the guys cheering and making lewd comments. _"Pigs."_

"Guess who got free drinks?" Brooke said in a sing-song voice as she returned to the table, smiling and bringing Sam's focus back to her. "Whoa." Hazel eyes widened, looking somewhere past Sam. "They don't waste any time getting things going here do they?" She inclined her head to the stage and Sam glanced in the gestured direction, her own eyes widening as she took in the now barely clothed woman on stage. One guy was wearing a discarded bra on his head and there were a **lot** of boobs on show. Sam spun in her seat so she was facing Brooke again, and instantly frowned.

"What the hell is that?" Sam shot back accusingly, pointing to the blonde's brightly coloured, umbrella-accented drink. "This isn't an excuse to get shmammered, Brooke. We're here to-" Brooke cut her off with a wave of her hand as she placed Sam's drink in front of her and sat down with her own.

"Free women from the oppression of chauvinistic male pigs." Sam's words. Seriously. She'd had them following the word 'operation' on a bullet-pointed sheet of A4. "I know exactly why we're here, Sam. But we can still enjoy ourselves while we conduct our investigation." Sam watched as Brooke tongued the straw into her mouth and let out a satisfied sigh as she sipped the pinky-orange liquid.

"**Our**?" Sam questioned sceptically. "I thought you were just here as backup." Brooke shrugged, blowing bubbles into her drink via the straw until she saw the look she was receiving and stopped.

"Backup with benefits." Sam's lips pursed and her eyes narrowed. Not noticing, the blonde sipped at the beverage. "So, I asked the guy behind the bar what the going rate for 'extra services' was-"

"You did what?" Sam asked, tone clipped and disbelieving. Her question was ignored.

"He said it started at three-hundred bucks!" Brooke absently stirred the ice in the glass, a noise of incredulity leaving her. "Can you believe that? I don't care **how** hot the girls here are, I wouldn't pay three-hundred dollars for head." Sam just stared. She stared until she was pretty sure her eyes were going to fall out of her head. And then she watched as Brooke giggled and took another gulp of her drink.

"Okay Miss Lightweight, I'm cutting you off at one." Hazel eyes rolled and blonde hair shook in defiance.

"You're going to be busy with strippers all night, I fail to see how you cutting me off will be possible."

"I'll tell the man with the liquor just how old you really are and that the ID you're carrying is a fake." At that, Brooke put her glass down onto the table.

"IDs I got Nicole to get us which we actually didn't need." A fair eyebrow rose in amusement. "If pretending to be your girlfriend is all it takes to get me into clubs with no hassle, I think I'm going to start calling you 'babe' and groping you whenever we're in the vicinity of a bouncer." Sam's head tilted ever so slightly and she adopted the kind of expression a confused puppy would wear. Then she smirked.

"If that's all it takes to get you to grope me…." And at the audible sound of Brooke's dropping open, Sam's smirk widened and she pushed her chair backwards and stood. "You know what they say about playing with fire, Princess. I'm off to sweet talk some strippers. **Don't**-" She extended a finger threateningly towards her tablemate. "Get into trouble." She leaned to pick up her drink, eyes still on Brooke. "I'm not the only one with the potential for recruitment."

"What is **that** supposed to mean?" Brooke called after Sam as she began to walk away. Sam didn't answer.

Sam sipped her drink as she wound her way through the tables, sizing up the patrons and employees, trying to discern which of them would be the least likely to report her to the bouncer the instant she mentioned the word 'questions'. The pickings were slim among the attendees, most ranging somewhere between horny young adult and sleazy middle-aged business man. She felt her skin crawl as she watched one of the 'business men' reach forward a stick a bill into one of the dancer's skimpy bottoms, then felt her stomach churn when the dancer smiled and giggled at him.

"_Oh god, I'd hate to have to pretend I enjoyed something that degraded me so much. These poor women… what kind of world do we live in when people have to fall so far just to make a living? Parading around in front of men old enough to be their fathers."_ She shuddered and then, with renewed vigour, approached a scantily clad woman who was standing off to the side behind a dais. As Sam neared her, the woman lifted her gaze and a wide smile spread across her face.

"Well hi, sugar." Sam's right eye twitched involuntarily as the southern twang sent her to a very bad visual place that involved Mary Cherry, an abundance of Vaseline and a pole. "It ain't often we get such pretty faces in here. What can I do you for this evenin'?" Sam stared at the woman for a few seconds, fully taking in the implications of such a question, before clearing her throat and attempting to string the right clump of words together to form a coherent sentence.

"I was um…" She became momentarily distracted by the dancer's smile and how white her teeth were. "Is there someone available I can talk to?"

"Well hun, that all depends on what kinda talkin' you wanna be doin'." And she went back to browsing what Sam then saw was some kind of appointment book. Names were listed beside dates and times and then different names were written on the opposite side of those. "We got dancers open all night, but if you want a more private…" She set green eyes on Sam through her long lashes. "Talk, Sappho is the only free girl right now, otherwise you'll have to wait. Not that I think you'd wanna miss out on Sappho. I think she'd be right up your ally, shug." Whether it was the dazzling smile that followed the statement or the statement itself that caused Sam to become flustered she didn't know, but suddenly she couldn't get her words out.

"Talk. Yes." Was all she managed, and even that came out barely above a squeak. The woman beamed at her, tipped her cowboy hat, and pencilled something in to the book before snapping it closed.

"You follow me, tiger. Rose's gonna hook you up." And Sam obeyed, wondering what the heck she'd just agreed to.

She was led behind the red curtain she and Brooke had passed on their way in. That was the first sign she'd maybe been misunderstood. Her eyes widened as they walked past the enclosed booths situated on either side of them and she heard various sounds of encouragement coming from within. That was the second.

The third came when she was led around a corner and into the furthest booth from the curtain, and a raven haired, scantily dressed woman was splayed across a fainting couch, spinning a golden bangle across the length of the glass table. When they entered, she slapped it flat, then picked it up and slid it up to sit below the others she had layering the upper half of her right arm.

Then she set a smile on Sam that made the reporter's stomach do something wholly unethical and unprecedented.

That was the forth.

"Hey." Brooke inwardly shuddered. "Can I buy you a drink?" The first time, it was semi flattering, even the second, but around the fourth it had hit annoying and the seventh person she'd wanted to cause serious bodily harm to. Silently she fumed that Sam had had the gall to up and leave her alone with seedy occupants of the night club. Stinking of cigarette smoke and booze. The only semi-good-looking people that were in the place were up on the stage and she was seriously considering paying the extra for a backroom with one of them just to have someone who didn't radiate slime to talk to. Even the one with the missing teeth, Brooke wasn't fussy, and the toothless dancer had nice eyes.

"No. Thank you." Was her stern, tight-lipped reply. For a moment, the guy looked like he was going to push his luck, but seemed to have a change of heart when Brooke shot him a look that could have turned Medusa to stone. He made a rude noise with his lips.

"Whatever, babe. Your loss."

"Yeah, I don't think so." Brooke muttered with a derisive sound and then turned her attention fully away from the slime ball. Her eyes travelled from one end of the room to the other, searching for a familiar face framed by dark hair, but to no avail, and she started to panic a little. A hand landed on her shoulder and she gritted her teeth and turned to snap at her newfound stalker, before she found herself at eyelevel with breasts that probably didn't belong to him.

"You lookin' for your girlfriend, shug?" She was wearing a cowboy hat that had been bejewelled to within and inch of its life, but that she somehow managed to look good in, and a matching sun-yellow bikini. Also glittered and, Brooke noticed as she dragged her gaze up to find twinkling green eyes, tasselled. She couldn't tell, and she sure as hell wasn't risking looking down again, but she'd bet her life that the woman was wearing cowboy boots as well.

"My what?" Brooke asked, speaking loudly over the sudden noise of up tempo music and the sound of a bubble machine turning on, not entirely sure she'd heard right.

"The cute lil' brunette you brought with you." Miss Southern Drawl expanded, raising a perfectly shaped blonde eyebrow.

"Oh!" What was it about two girls going to a strip club together that made everyone think they were 'together' together? "No, we're not, we're just here as, she's my-" Brooke paused to take a breath. "We're not dating. Or anything." The dancer shrugged but the glimmer in her gaze remained and told Brooke that she didn't believe a word of what she was saying. Whatever, being Sam's girlfriend had gotten here in here, had probably gotten her that first free drink and the two that had followed, and was to thank for the pleasant buzz now humming through her body.

"Uh huh. Whatever you say, shug." She surprised Brooke by pulling out the seat Sam had previously occupied and sat down, waving over at the bartender. "You don't mind if I sit a spell, do you?" She asked, accent thick, green eyes sparkling, and Brooke found herself a little too tongue-tied to respond with actual words, so she settled for a quick nod of her head. "I'm Rose." A hand was extended to her and Brooke had time to notice her nails were painted a matching yellow before she took it to shake.

"Let me guess." She said with a smile. "You're the Yellow Rose of Texas?" The dancer beamed, flashing pearly white teeth, and poking the brim of her hat with a finger so it shifted higher up her head.

"Why yes Ma'am, I am. And what pretty name should I put to your pretty face?" And Brooke blushed. Actually blushed. Which was oddly embarrassing itself considering she was in the presence of a stripper. A stripper whose hand was still in hers, a fact that only made her blush harder and, in a moment of dreamlike insanity, release a flustered giggle.

"Brooke." Rose smirked at her, apparently fully aware of her flustered state and the reason for it, and turned in her seat so she could place her cowboy-booted feet on a vacant chair near Brooke.

"Well that's a mighty pretty name indeed, Miss Brooke." And somehow, the southern drawl that was sometimes horrifying when coming from Mary Cherry, literally dripped with sexiness when coming from the woman across from her. The thought was strangely disconcerting and Brooke tried to ignore it and focus on what Rose was actually saying to her. "And what is a lady like yourself doing in a place like this with her not-girlfriend?" The dancer's eyes were sparkling, teasing, and it made Brooke shift in her seat.

"Oh you know..." Brooke hesitated, waving her hand to bat at the air. "She wanted to come, I offered company."

"So you were just being friendly? Accompanying her to a strip joint? Well, it ain't very friendly-like how she's just up and left you for Sappho...." The blonde's ears perked up at that and she found herself glancing around.

"She's with Sappho?" Rose nodded, a knowing look in her eyes that Brooke didn't much enjoy seeing. "She's one of your dancers, right?" The older woman chuckled.

"Oh shug, she ain't just a dancer. She's **the** dancer 'round these parts. I escorted your friend to the back room myself." Rose paused to lick her lips. "And for the record, she ain't **mine**."

"Oh." And that was all Brooke could find to say, and she said it with a frown. Because, despite the oddly confusing emotions the other blonde's words stirred in her, all she could think about was what she'd said before that. And while she knew the reason Sam was back there, she still felt inexplicably pissed. And like every good stripper, Miss Yellow Rose of Texas could feel the annoyance coming off Brooke in waves.

"Listen hun, I see a lot of people workin' here. Some people are just out lookin' for a good time, others come here 'cause they got nowhere else to go. But sometimes...." She dropped her feet from the chair and leaned forward in her own to take Brooke's hand again. "Well, sometimes I see people in here just lookin' for acceptance from someone." Brooke's frown deepened and she pulled her hand away.

"I'm not looking for acceptance. Who comes to a strip club to look for that?" Rose shrugged.

"People who can't find it nowhere else, I reckon." Brooke kept silent, hazel eyes trained on the woman across from her. "Look shug, all I'm saying is, if you wanna sit here and stare at the curtain until your Bambi-eyed beauty appears from behind it, be my guest. Or, I can take you in after her." Pearly white teeth were flashed Brooke's way in a smile that was as stunning as it was mischievous.

"Look, I told you, we're not-"

"Blah, blah, blah. I heard you the first time, darlin'. You ain't girlfriends. But that sure as hell don't mean at least one of you doesn't wanna be. I ain't blind, I got eyes, I saw it soon as y'all walked in the room together. She might be a little slow on the uptake, but you know what you want. You wouldn't have come to a place like this just to spend time with her otherwise." For a second, Brooke felt panic gripping at her with its cold, gnarled fingers, but it released her after a brief squeeze when she realised that there wasn't any need to hide right now. That she'd been found out, and she actually felt better because of it. Lighter in a way.

"You know, you should have your own advice column in the paper." Rose laughed and leaned back in her chair, the tassels of her bikini top swaying with the motion.

"I think I do more good giving advice to pretty lil' things like you than I ever would with some barely read half page in the newspaper." And Brooke thought that she probably had a point.

"So, Rose, what do you suggest my plan of action be?"

"Like I said, we can waltz right back there and you can slap her silly. Or you can play it her way and have a lil' fun of your own. Make her open her eyes a little wider." Slowly, Brooke began to smile. Because with Sam, game playing had always been the preferred option.

Sam sat awkwardly on the single, armless, plush red chair foot tapping nervously against the leg of the table between them. Across from her, Sappho was still lounging provocatively on the fainting couch. The reporter had tried several times to start something that resembled speaking, but nothing ever came out, and Sappho herself wasn't helping matters. She just lay there looking seductive and kept smiling at Sam, like this happened all the time when people were in her presence. Which, Sam suspected, it probably did. The woman was smouldering. Dark, almost onyx-black hair framed deep, piercing blue eyes that every now and then she would sweep wispy bangs away from. Her skin was olive toned and perfect, not a mark anywhere that Sam could see. Not that she was looking. She wore strappy leather sandals on her feet, the nails of which were immaculately kept but unpainted, and a mid-thigh length toga style dress that **had** Sam been looking, she would have noticed was almost see-through. Sam felt disgust rear up at her momentary, repeated, flash of attraction and she forced it away, reminding herself why she was here.

"I...." She paused, took a second to be embarrassed, then cleared her throat and tried again. "I have some questions for you." Sappho's perfectly shaped eyebrows rose and she sat up, leaning forward with an elbow on her knee, her head resting on her hand and an ample amount of cleavage on show.

"Questions?" She had an accent. It was deep, and thick, and so exotic sounding that Sam would have sworn it was real. "I am not used to such things. Usually I am the one talking."

"I'm not here for what you think I am." Sam blurted unceremoniously. Sappho's brows pulled together and she pouted, sliding from the couch and onto the table separating them like some kind of disappointed lioness.

"You are not here for me?" Hands sensually stroking the tops of her thighs, even through the jeans, made Sam swallow convulsively.

"Uh..." She let out a nervous laugh and grabbed the dancer's hands. "I am, I mean, I am but I'm not looking for... um... a performance?" Sappho just pouted harder.

"You are not supposed to touch." Sam balked and instantly relinquished her grip, blinking several times when the older woman giggled and took her hands again. "But I don't mind if **you** do." And then Sam's hands were touching warm, soft skin, and she was almost positive her fingertips grazed underwear. She gasped, eyes going wide and eyebrows high, as she pulled her hands out from beneath the skimpy toga and stumbled into a standing position, putting a little distance between them. Sappho simply went back to looking like a kicked puppy, a hot one, turning her big blue eyes up to look at Sam. "Sweet Muses, are you..." She lowered her voice, her eyebrows this time pinching in sympathy. "A virgin?" This was definitely not going as Sam had planned. Her face flared red and she stumbled around the table to sit on the recently vacated fainting couch.

"That isn't, that's not even...." She flopped down, taking a deep breath. "Yes, but that isn't why I'm here." Sappho shimmied so that she was facing Sam again, legs hanging off the edge of the table and brushing the reporter's in an uncomfortably intimate gesture.

"Then... why **are** you here?" Blue eyes bore into her with an intense intrigue, because Sam supposed that this didn't happen all that often. People coming to Sappho to actually talk, instead of 'talk'. But Sam had a job to do, though she had almost forgotten what exactly that was innumerable times now, and she wasn't leaving until she'd gotten the information she'd come for.

"I'm here to...." Sam cleared her throat and reached into the inside pocket of her jacket, producing a Dictaphone. "I'd like to ask you a few questions." The reporter's eyes travelled from the dancer's eyebrows, now knitted together, down to the lip she had snared between her teeth.

"What kind of questions?" Sam felt herself relax as she began slipping into journalist mode, enjoying the rush of professionalism that swept through her. She hit the record button on the small rectangular machine and placed it on the table beside the other woman.

"What you do here, your job. Specifically, I would like to know why you work at such an establishment. Is it purely the money? Were you perhaps...." She paused, searching for the right words. "Were you pushed into this job? I'd like to know why women feel the need to involve themselves in an occupation that is so degrading." Sappho's frown deepened and her expression stayed that way for a long few seconds, before her mouth opened and she started laughing.

"I am not here because someone makes me!" The dark woman chuckled, smiling knowingly at Sam. "I love my job."

"You-" Sam's mouth parted and her jaw hung, limply. "You what?" Again, Sappho chuckled.

"You are so young still and so mentally set in your ways." Sam scowled, affronted, and began to protest. "Ah, ah, ah." Sappho held up a finger to stop her. "You think all women that become like me do it because they have to, yes?" Sam didn't answer. "Because they want the money or because they have no other option, or are pressured into it. It never entered your mind that some people might actually **enjoy** this line of work." And Sam didn't argue. Because she couldn't. She hadn't considered that, it hadn't even occurred to her that she should.

"But not all-" She gesticulated somewhat wildly, reaching for the least offensive words. "Exotic dancers enjoy what they do." Sappho nodded, looking solemn.

"This is true. I have met many young women who come to such places as this because they have nowhere else to go. It is sad." Piercing blue eyes met Sam's with determination. "But it is not true of all cases. My father wanted me to become business person, like him, but I enjoy my time here too much. I love pleasing women." Sappho leaned forward and ran her fingertips along Sam's forearms. The brunette took a shuddering breath, her own fingers twitching as the dancer's made contact with them. "Now I may please you?" Awkwardly, Sam disentangled her hands from the older woman's and tried to scoot further back in her seat.

"I-I'm not… I mean, I already-"

"Do you not like women?" The question caught whatever words Sam was trying to sputter out and held them in a grip so tight that they were instantly turned to dust. Being questioned by a stripper was not something that was supposed to happen, Sam's plan distinctly said it was to be the other way around.

"I-I-I don't…." And instead of being quick to respond, like any good reporter should be, Sam just found herself stuttering, inwardly flailing and trying desperately to reach for some half-assed answer that didn't exist yet.

"You have girlfriend?" Why in the world had she agreed to talk with a woman who obviously preferred the fairer sex? She'd been asking for trouble.

"No, I don't-"

"Am I not pleasing to your eyes?" And now, the stripper looked sad. And Sam felt like she had suddenly been thrown in way over her head. She'd been completely prepared to have to hightail it out of there in the event of her being found to be a minor. She was not, however, at all equipped to deal with a dejected, scantily clad exotic dancer. Sam sighed and ran her fingers through her hair, an apologetic smile tugging at her lips.

"No, it's not that. You're very…" She paused and pursed her lips before sucking in a deep breath. "You're very attractive." Sappho's crestfallen expression vanished, swallowed by a dazzling smile that made Sam feel even more uncomfortable in the close quarters.

"I sense there is a 'but'…." Sappho stood suddenly, tiny skirt twirling and lifting to expose a healthy amount of thigh as she pirouetted. And landed in the spot right next to Sam on the couch. "There is a girl." It wasn't a question. Nervous laughter exploded from Sam, but she fought the urge to stand and move away.

"Look, I really just came here to get some questions answered and since I'm apparently still mentally childlike-" The rest of the reporter's sentence trailed away and disappeared into the tinkling laughter coming from the exotic beauty.

"That is not what I said."

"Yeah, well, you might as well have." And Sam, not that she was aware of it, was pouting, which only made Sappho giggle all the more.

"Tell me, how old are you?" Sam felt a jolt of adrenaline, or fear, rush through her.

"Twenty-two." Sappho made a 'tsk' noise.

"Do you lie that badly to your mother?" Sam felt the heat rushing to her cheeks and inwardly cringed. Now what?

"Seventeen." Her father had always told her that the only way out of a lie was to tell the truth, so you might as well be truthful in the first place. She needed to listen to that piece of advice more often. The woman's laughter stopped and dark eyes glanced over to find the dancer staring at her with an unreadable expression.

"You are… very young." Sam's face crumpled as she frowned.

"Please don't tell anyone. I swear, if you just let me leave quietly I won't come back asking questions again." Plumb-red lips rolled in on themselves and then opened with an audible pop.

"I will not tell." Relief washed over Sam. "But now I get to ask **you** a question." And then shot right through the pit of her stomach, pulling her heart along for the ride. Because she had a feeling she knew what the question was going to be, and she'd already acknowledged the fact that lying was pointless - if only to herself - so the ability to get out of this situation unscathed was suddenly as thin as paper. "Does the girl know how you feel?"

Since when were strippers so goddamn insightful?

"I think I'm drunk." Brooke sighed, somewhat dramatically, and lifted the bottle to her lips again. Rose, booted leg propped up on a chair, elbow on her elevated knee and her cheek resting against her fisted hand, chuckled at her.

"You ain't drunk, shug. You're just buzzed." And the fact that it took Brooke a full three seconds to focus on the southerner made her question the accuracy of Rose's words. She was pretty sure she'd fall over if she stood up and wondered what other symptoms she needed to be suffering from to be considered smashed. She could really do without the puking, since she suspected that wouldn't help her situation at all.

"And how was this supposed to help me?" She asked, knocking back the remainder of the beer with one eye closed and the other on the woman across from her. Rose regarded her, amused.

"You needed some loosenin' up, darlin'." She said, reaching over and tilting up the bottom of the bottle with her fingers, draining the last few drops out and then taking it from Brooke's grasp. "Gives you courage."

"I have courage." Brooke argued. "I have crap loads of courage." Rose dropped her foot from the chair and shifted forward in her own, placing her forearms on the table and leaning in close to the other blonde. Brooke's head jerked a little, but she remained mostly still, holding her breath.

"Yeah, shug?" Rose murmured, a smirk trailing along her lips. "Prove it." Brooke swallowed and, after a strangely agonizing few seconds, leaned back in her chair.

"How?" Her voice croaked a little and she dropped her gaze away from the green eyes boring into her, embarrassed. Rose's gentle laughter floated to her ears.

"Jeez Louise, girl! Ain't you got no imagination?" Brooke rolled her eyes at the woman's rising chuckles, but found it somewhat impossible not to laugh along with her. "Alright, I'll help you out, shug. But don't think being pretty will get you everything forever." She felt her cheeks colour and was once again reminded of how strange this evening had turned out to be. She definitely hadn't anticipated having a good time with a stripper, let alone taking advice from one of them. "You gotta get this Sam's attention, right?" Brooke nodded. "What better way to get someone's attention than to make them jealous?"

"And how do you propose I do that?" Rose's eyes twinkled with mischief and it made Brooke's heart thud harder in her chest.

"I don't know if you noticed, hun, but all the men started being filtered out of here about a half hour ago. Know what that means?" Nervous, Brooke gnawed at her lower lip and shook her head. "Ladies night is gonna start real soon. Which means your girlfriend's time with Miss Sappho is being stretched mighty thin, because Sappho is our number one girl come ladies night. So, your little brunette bombshell is going to be out here in minutes. You wanna just be sitting here all alone when she comes out, no more closer to what you want than when you came in? Or d'you wanna be sitting at the foot of that there stage with my g-string in your teeth?" Brooke's swallow caught painfully in her throat and Rose's eyes sparkled as she smirked. "Got any ones?"

"She just… she drove me so crazy, you know? And I was **so** against our parents merging us into a singular family unit, it should have been obvious. I knew didn't want to be thought of as her sister, but I was too stupid to realise **why**. That it wasn't just contempt." Sam ran her fingers through her hair and exhaled loudly.

"You are not stupid." Sappho chuckled gently, smiling. "You are young. These things you learn with experience, with age." The toga-wearing woman playfully bumped her shoulder against Sam's. "I had the same thing happen to me when I was young."

"Really?" Sam asked, eyebrows raised and looking hopeful. She hated feeling stupid.

"Not exactly the same, because your life is like dramatic American soap opera." The reporter laughed. "But there was a girl I liked, only I did not know I liked her. I was very mean to her…." Sappho sighed, playing with the golden edges of her dress. "And one day I found her crying because of something I had said to her." The woman's eyebrows knitted together. "It hurt me very much to see her like that because of me, and that was strange, because I thought I enjoyed being mean to her. But I realised that I didn't, that I was just trying to push her away by being mean to her. So I stopped." Sam was contemplatively silent for a while, musing over the tale just told to her.

"What happened?"

"Eventually, I told her how I felt, but…." A sad smile lit the other woman's face and Sam felt her stomach knot uncomfortably. "She did not feel the same. We remained very close friends though." Sam's dark eyes narrowed.

"Was that story intended to make me feel better? Because it didn't." Sappho smiled wryly at her.

"It should." Sam raised her eyebrows, but the stripper spoke again before she could enquire as to why. "Because if I had not asked, I would never have known. And the heartache of that would have been far worse than that of the rejection."

"Oh." The cynic in Sam wanted to deny the truth of the words, but the realist with the romantic side wouldn't let her. "But I don't want things to change." She said sadly, using her thumb and forefinger to pinch the bridge of her nose.

"Don't you?" Dark eyes popped open at the reproachful sounding question, and she found Sappho frowning harshly at her. "You **do** want things to change." The dancer snapped, her demeanour shifting drastically from temptress to pissed off predator in the time it took Sam to blink. "You only want them to change for the better. You are not willing to risk your heart in the face of rejection! You are a coward."

"Hey!" Sam snapped. "I'm not a coward. I'm afraid. There's a difference." The dancer huffed, gesturing wildly with one hand as she spoke, golden bangles dancing as she did so.

"But what I say is true. You only want to take the risk if the dream you are reaching for will be made real." Sappho leaned forward and rested her hand on the reporter's knee. "You must realise that the risk is **always** worth taking, no matter the outcome. Especially if it is a risk of the heart. Because, while those risks are the most deadly, they are also the ones that make you feel the most alive. Be it love flowing through you afterwards or pain." Sam was silent. Staring down at the hand on her leg, she realised that what the other woman was saying was right. Which, once again, made her wonder how she'd ended up in this position.

"_In a private booth at a strip joint, getting advice on love from the top lesbian performer."_ She chuckled aloud, but the sound was stolen from her lips by a small gasp when she registered that small, four letter word she'd just thought. Because, of course she was in love with Brooke. It was so insane considering their past together that it made perfect sense, and she'd definitely been feeling it. She just hadn't put the word together with the emotions until now. It was freeing and terrifying, and it made her want to laugh. Because it made her feel alive. "You're right." She whispered. "You're completely right." Louder that time, as she lifted her head and met azure eyes that startled her every time she looked into them. "You Greeks always were frighteningly philosophical. Always kinda wondered whether or not that changed when books stopped printing the word 'ancient' before 'Greece' or if you're still like that." She joked playfully, and Sappho grinned at her, lifting her hand from Sam's knee and stretching her arm out across the back of the couch.

"Well, now you know." She said, idly teasing a strand of Sam's dark hair. "And knowing is half the battle." Focused on the odd sensations flowing down from her scalp, Sam remained still and silent for a moment.

"Did you just reference GI Joe?" Eyebrows raised in incredulity and jaw slack from the same, Sam's expression apparently tickled Sappho's funny bone and the dancer chuckled raucously.

"So, what are you going to do now?" Sam was asked once the laughter had quieted, and she sighed, though she was smiling through it.

"I think i'm just..." She waved her hand towards the curtain giving them their privacy. "Going to tell her. I mean, that's all I can do, right? Tell her everything and hope for the best?" Sappho nodded.

"If you don't want to be riddled with regret and sorrow for the rest of your life, yes." Sam's eyebrows pulled together once more.

"You really know how to make a girl feel happy." Sarcasm dripped from the words, but they didn't deter the older woman, who smirked and this time ran her fingers deeper into Sam's hair, combing them through to the tips. The reporter's body shivered involuntarily and she blushed.

"If you were not so in love and so dangerously underage," Sappho quipped with a teasingly warning smile, leaning in to brush her lips against Sam's ear. "I would happily show you how I usually make girls happy." What was supposed to come out as a nervous giggle, tripped and died on the reporter's lips as an embarrassingly strangled gasp. Sappho moved back to find Sam's cheeks once more coloured a deep crimson and she let out another hearty laugh, before standing and taking the brunette's hands to pull her with her. "You are cute when you blush."

"Uh, thanks?" Sappho relinquished her hold.

"When will you tell her?" Sam pursed her lips.

"Tonight? I mean, better sooner than later. I'll just go out there and find her, we'll go home and I'll just-"

"She is here?" Sappho interrupted with wide eyes. "She is here with you?" Sam nodded slowly.

"Yeah, she wanted to keep an eye on me." Dark eyes rolled, but good-naturedly. "Make sure I didn't get recruited."

"She came here with you, to watch you..." Sappho began, slowly annunciating each word. "Though she could have been doing numerous other things... and you have been back here with me for the better part of an hour, leaving her alone with her thoughts of what we might be doing." Sam blinked. "You are very pretty." Sappho said with a smile and then a roll of her own eyes. "But you are also very stupid."

"Hey!" Sam said again, not remembering the last time she had had to defend herself so many times during the course of an evening. It had been a while since she and Brooke had come to verbal blows in a manner that was anything other than playful.

"And while you're eyes are pretty..." She started again, grasping Sam's hand and pulling her towards the thick draping masquerading as an entrance/exit. "I suspect you have been walking through life blind as Oedipus." Sam balked at the statement.

"Did you just compare me to a guy who unknowingly killed his own father, married his mother, had children with her, and then gouged his own eyes out when he found she had killed herself and after learning the truth?" Sappho huffed in irritation.

"It is not the phrase itself so much as the meaning held within it."

"What are you talking about?" Sam questioned, completely bewildered and only half noticing the muffled words and moans coming from within the booths she was passing as the dancer pulled her towards the red velvet curtain that hid them from the view of the main room. Sappho just laughed and Sam had the fleeting thought that she would probably remember that laugh for a long time.

"Teenagers." Was her response, said with light-hearted disdain and as Sappho came to an abrupt stop, almost causing Sam to collide with her. "She did not have to offer to baby-sit you while you played reporter, yes?"

"Yes." Sam paused, pulling her hand out of the other woman's grip to bring both of them up to rub her temples. "I mean, no." She paused. "Wait, we need to rewind so I can be offended." Green eyes rolled and dark hair shook as Sappho firmly denied the request.

"No. There is no time. The longer you are in here, the worse things get." Sam's fingers slipped into her hair and she tugged at it for a moment, before she threw her hands out, almost imploringly, in front of herself.

"**What** is getting worse? Stop being cryptic! You sound like a damn mythic riddle."

"She could have let you come alone. Or waited to see if another friend offered to accompany you. She did not, instead, she offered first. She accompanied you here, risking the very real possibility of being caught, not to watch you. Anyone could have watched you. She came to spend time with you." Her voice was simultaneously annoyed and amused. "And you can neither see that or the reason behind it." Sam was frowning so deeply, Sappho wondered if she was giving herself a headache. And feeling a pull of compassion that didn't often strike her, she decided to help guide this particular strand of Sam's thread through the Fates' loom. "You are not the only one who thought about taking risks for love tonight." Sam's face became creased with confusion, something that was both endearing and endlessly annoying. Sappho mumbled something indistinct and resisted the urge to grab Sam by the shoulders and shake her. "She feels the same way for you that you feel for her, you-you, idiot!" The insult sounded strange coming out heavily accented, but no less offensive. She was about to protest, when the woman lifted a finger to stop her. "No more words, not for me. Go out there and tell her everything you feel, before you lose your chance. Or your nerve." And with an insistent shove, Sam was pushed towards the draping curtain. Her fingers gripped at the cloth, pushing and pulling it out of her way until finally the red and deep purple lights of the main room lit her vision. She became abruptly aware of the music filling the space, briefly wondered how she hadn't heard it until that second, and then felt her eyebrows rise when she noticed that the few scattered groups of men had been replaced by scores of women. She felt Sappho move up behind her and lean in.

"Ladies Night." The dancer's lips were practically pressed against Sam's ear and her voice was raised to assure she'd be heard over the noise, and the reporter felt her skin prickle pleasantly. She nodded to let her know she'd heard and let her eyes scan the room again. The journalistic part of herself was outraged. She'd come here to investigate on something she'd considered to be incredibly demeaning to women, something that used them when they were vulnerable and paraded them around naked in front of perverted males, but now the room was filled with women like herself. They were watching and hollering and generally behaving as bad as some of the men she'd previously seen in there. And as Sam surveyed the entertainment, watched as short-haired woman dressed as a cop - though she highly doubted that the uniform she was wearing would meet regulations - hopped down off of the stage and, grinning, made her way over to an older woman and proceeded to gyrate against her, she wondered why this side of the industry was so seldom talked about. She supposed it was because people didn't like to think of women enjoying themselves while they did what others deemed demeaning. Maybe people were still too close minded to even consider the idea that women might enjoy being looked at as sexual beings, might get off on being hollered at. That women themselves enjoyed watching it just as much as the guys did. Inwardly, Sam chuckled. She'd been one of those people before stepping in there. Never in her wildest dreams would she have thought that there were women out there who actually enjoyed being strippers. She couldn't wait to tell Brooke, maybe kick up some kind of argumentative debate about what was morally right and wrong. Sam had a whole new outlook on things, everything really, thanks to this place and she couldn't wait to share her newfound opinions.

She set her eyes around the room, trying to remember which table they'd been sitting at, but not seeing the blonde at any of them. Pulling her eyebrows together, she glanced over at the bar, noted each woman lined up there to order, but saw no sign of Brooke. Over at the stage area, the excited ladies sat around the main raised area and the offshoots that reached into the crowd. But still, no Brooke. Sam exhaled nosily, musing that it would be just perfect if Brooke had come along to make sure she wasn't recruited and ended up being tempted into the stripper fold instead. Her eyes travelled from the topless dancers working the poles, bills ticking out from the elastic of their barely-there undergarments, to the ones working the floors. Teasing the ever willing patrons with touches that promised more and dances that pleasurably invaded the boundary of personal space. Sam caught sight of a cowboy hat and recognised the stripper as the one who had led her to Sappho earlier. She paused her search to watch, and while she'd like to claim journalistic intrigue she couldn't ignore the flames licking at the pit of her stomach as she watched the woman move. It wasn't like this was something she saw everyday. Women being openly sexual towards other women. It was nice. Or, better word; it was hot.

Absently, Sam pulled her lower lip between her teeth and bit down gently, watching as the cowgirl placed a hand on the lucky receiver's shoulder and used the leverage to do something Sam would have previously considered to be entirely impossibly with her hips. She wondered what kind of a view the blonde was getting, bent forward slightly and with a finger hooked in the string of the bright yellow bikini, pulling back the elastic to place a bill between it and tanned skin.

"_With her teeth."_ Sam noted with wide eyes as an odd ache swept through an area low in her stomach. _"Nice, that's... nice."_ She watched the dancer ran her fingers through golden tresses and pulled the recipient's head up. Distractedly, Sam noticed the blonde's finger graze the stripper's toned thigh, but then her gaze was torn away. Because the woman in the chair was leaning back, and Sam felt something ugly and uncomfortable claw at her gut, clench around her heart and stop blood from getting to areas that needed it. At least she'd found Brooke.

As strippers of varying shapes and sizes took to the stage and started their own routines, Rose pulled Brooke along by the hand through the suddenly largely populated tables and towards one near the front that was somehow vacant.

"Why is this one empty?" Brooke asked, stumbling slightly as Rose stopped in front of her. "Is this like those seats in Sea World?" She asked, starting to giggle as she adopted an overly high-pitched 'announcers' voice. "First three rows will get wet!" Rose tilted her hat back and lifted one corner of her lips in a smirk, green eyes sparkling.

"Shug, when me and my girls are on stage, it ain't just the first three rows that have to worry about getting wet." Upon later reflection, Brooke would be pretty sure she'd squeaked when the cowgirl's hand was suddenly resting just above her breasts and she found herself being pushed backwards into a chair.

"Uh, so do I have to, I mean, is there something people usually-" Brooke stammered, completely terrified and slightly, shamefully, turned on by the sight of Rose standing above her, looking at her like she was about to be taken on the ride of her life. Which, she suspected, she probably was. Her life up to now anyway. "Am I supposed to do something specific?" She finally managed to ask, and watched as Rose's lightly glossed lips parted to release a low chuckle.

"Guess you ain't never had a lap dance before, huh?" She questioned, rhetorically, with a wry grin. "Well then, let me be the first to tell you to sit back…" Brooke's body involuntarily jerked backwards as Rose completely invaded her personal space and stood with her legs either side of Brooke's knees. "Hold on tight…" Having no idea where else to put them, she left her hands resting on her knees, fingers clutching reflexively at the material of her skirt as Rose bent forward over Brooke and braced her hands on the back of the chair, leaning in to practically purr into her ear as the tassels on her arm bands tickled Brooke's neck. "And get ready to scream."

Sam stood, horrifyingly transfixed, watching the bejwelled cowgirl roll her hips against Brooke's thighs. She saw Brooke giggle and lift her hands to grip the stripper's slender hips, something feeling suspiciously like jealousy smacking her square in the chest and then trickling out to all corners of her body. Her pulse hammered and she felt her temperature spike, perfectly content to blame the jealousy and nothing else, but still her legs wouldn't move. They felt like the bones had been replaced with really heavy jelly. She was vaguely aware of Sappho moving from behind her to beside her, but she couldn't even convince the peripheral portion of her vision to shift from the sight before her. Rose lifted a hand, pausing to run the fingers of it through fairer blonde hair, and then gripped the brim of her hat, swooped it dramatically from her head and dropped it onto Brooke's. Rationally, Sam knew she couldn't hear Brooke's laughter, not over the music, but she could hear it inside her head. It conjured remembered feelings, dampened until that evening, and she recalled how it made her feel to be the one making Brooke laugh. And she realised there wasn't a word that embodied everything she felt when she made that happen, that the closest would be euphoria or elation, or some other only 'close' variant. She didn't like that someone else was probably feeling that right now. She didn't care if that person was male or female, she only cared that it wasn't her, and that that fact was making her blood boil. It did however allow her to block out the inappropriate feelings of desire trying to dig their way in.

"Why are you watching? Why are you not looking for your girl?" Sappho's lilting voice somehow did manage to break through though, and Sam glanced briefly to her side to find the striking woman watching her.

"Because I already found her." She half spat, turning her attention back. "And it looks like she's having a fine time without me." Sensing more questions, Sam inclined her head in Brooke's direction. "She's the one in the chair with Miss 'save a horse, ride a cowgirl' hanging all over her. God, I am so **stupid**." Suddenly, Sappho was in front of her, obscuring her vision.

"Why do you say that?" She demanded, looking thoroughly annoyed. "You are stupid because she is enjoying time with Rose? That does not make sense. You are too hard on yourself, Sam. Here, that-" She gestured behind herself. "Is what people do. They have fun. She probably thinks you were having fun with me, yes?" Sam didn't respond. "And you have no right to be jealous." Sam's eyes snapped to the green ones before her. She wanted to argue, oh god she really did, and there was an angry retort just dying to leap from her lips, but she knew that Sappho was right. Again. This outing had not been conducive to her ego.

"Doesn't mean I have to like it." She muttered darkly, and Sappho's lips curled up at the corners.

"Nor does it mean you have to stand by and watch." Sam sighed. Moments ago she had been so sure of what she was going to do, but seeing Brooke with another woman all over her had somewhat taken the wind from her sails and set fire to them. The dancer before her moved back to her side, allowing Brooke and Rose back into Sam's line of sight. The tall blonde stripper was now straddling Brooke's knees and had a feather boa, undoubtedly picked off of passing waitress since they all seemed to be wearing them, lassoed around her neck, and her hands on the woman's bare thighs. Sam watched as Rose began slowly wrapping the boa around her hand, reeling Brooke in. Watched as Brooke's lips dropped slightly from a grin to a smile as she was pulled closer. And Sam's feet were moving before she really had time to register the rage and ugly jealousy roaring through her, weaving her between tables filled with woman who couldn't help but glance over and watch her go, trailing waves of invisible fire behind her. Everything felt dreamlike around her as she neared her targets. Her eyes saw in slow motion as Brooke's head, now bare centimetres from Rose's, turned towards her, hair bunching out over the feathery lasso with the movement.

Brooke's smile faded completely. She felt it leave her face almost the same instant she felt Rose, thankfully, stall her forward motion. Her heart was thudding so hard against her ribs, she could hear it in her ears, and for a second she couldn't decipher whether or not it was Rose's almost kiss or Sam's just being there that was causing it. Then the fire in Sam's eyes chased away the flustered haze swimming around her head and Brooke knew. And somehow, her heart beat faster.

"What the hell are you doing?" Sam's voice came out a lot louder than she intended and all conversation ceased dramatically around them until all that could be heard was the low thrum of the music that some far off seeming DJ had turned down. All of Brooke's other brain and bodily functions were apparently indisposed, because it appeared as though all she could do was blink. "Do you seriously have that little control over your hormones that I can't leave you alone for two minutes without coming back to find someone dry humping you?" Sam was aware her voice was slightly more high pitched than usual, but she couldn't bring it back down to what could be considered a more accepting decibel. She knew she should calm down, perhaps be rational about this whole situation. Look at the funny side of it. Brooke had been in the process of receiving a lap dance, something that had a high potential for amusement, not to mention the fire it had started stoking in the pit of her stomach, so it would have been semi easy to just laugh this off. But everything about Brooke got under her skin, agitated her in one way or another, and she was pissed off. And from the look in the hazel eyes boring into her own from beneath the brim of the cowboy hat, she guessed Brooke was feeling pretty similar.

"Says the girl who came here looking for a story and ended up finding the top lesbian performer's private room." The blonde barked back, snidely. "I don't think you're in any kind of position to be grilling me about hormonal morals, considering you probably spent the last hour flat on your back." Brooke realised, even as the words were leaving her mouth, that she was maybe taking things a step to far. Crossing some verbal boundary that had yet to be crossed in any of their vocal sparing matches. But there was something about Sam that set her on fire, practically grabbed her by her hair and dragged her across that line.

Sam visibly balked at the statement, feeling her cheeks warm as colour rushed to them. This only angered her further, she had **no** reason to be embarrassed. She hadn't done anything with anyone in any back room, even though she most definitely could have. Had maybe even wanted to a little. But she **hadn't.** And here was the reason why, helping a stripper off her lap and still managing to act holier-than-thou, and like some-

"Jealous?" She was glad Rose had, by this point, moved off of her and had already made herself scarce, because Brooke's knee-jerk reaction to the smugly asked question was to catapult to her feet in some kind of surprised/outraged/flustered-hybrid flurry.

"Are you?" Brooke snapped back, the retort slipping easily from her lips while her brain was distracted, and she shot Rose a look over Sam's shoulder. The cowgirl lifted a tasselled arm from its position folded across her chest and gave Brooke a thumbs up and a grin. The usual response to such a question would have been a 'don't make me laugh' laugh and a condescending eye roll, but Sam's face suddenly grew almost stony, almost emotionless, but with an underlying vulnerability that was barely visible.

"Yes." The soundtrack to life, playing on a shiny black LP in Brooke's head, caught and skipped, repeating that one single word over and over again. Sam's mind was blank, literally blank. There was a stark whiteness where there would usually be various ideas, scenarios she'd dreamt up during chem. class while sitting next to Brooke. Scenarios that were no longer needed, because all those way of confessing her feelings she'd dreamt up? Yeah, this hadn't been one of them. Apparently regardless of that, it was happening anyway.

"What?" Brooke asked, sounding like she genuinely hadn't heard her, but Sam knew she had. Knew there was no way even with the thumping pulse of the music that that one word had been lost. It was funny really, how three little letters could make up such a life altering statement.

"You heard me." She said, quiet but firm, not wanting to repeat herself and wishing so badly she could look anywhere but at the hazel eyes before her, but she refused to let her gaze drop.

"You're jealous?" The blonde finally managed, choking the words out like she didn't believe they could be swallowed. Sam shifted from foot to foot, but didn't say anything.

"Told ya, Shug." Rose drawled, but the southerner's voice seemed far away to Brooke. Like she was whispering from the other end of a really long tunnel and Brooke wasn't sure how she was hearing what she was saying. She was vaguely aware of someone shushing the stripper.

"Told her what?" Sam flipped her hair out of her eyes, setting a harsh look on Rose who simply smiled and let it roll off her back. And Brooke's entire body tightened, because anything that left the cowgirl's mouth now could only end in some kind of explosion.

"That it'd only take some stiff competition to make you lose your head." Sam's eyes narrowed as she continued to stare at Rose, and then a wave of clarity washed over her and they widened, her head jerking to look at Brooke.

"This was some kind of game?" A tremor slithered up from Brooke's feet and made her arms shake, sending her stomach into turmoil along the way. "To see how I'd react? God Brooke, what is **wrong** with you?" Sam's face was twisted in disgust, but hurt glinted in her eyes, making them glassy.

"It wasn't a game!" The blonde almost shrieked, hands tugging her hair behind her ears in frustration. "You're so blind, Sam. I swear to god, the idea of you becoming an investigative reporter defies logic sometimes." The brunette blinked, all emotion save one draining from her, leaving only shock in their wake. "You've been handed solid gold evidence and all you want to do is argue about the conspiracy theories." An affronted frown creased the reporter's forehead and she opened her mouth to respond, but found herself cut off.

"For the love of Hera!" Sappho's voice was harsh and chiding, and it captured both girl's attention. "Never in my life have I witnessed a lover's quarrel take place in an establishment such as this!" Rose chuckled.

"They ain't lovers, shug." Rose's eyes raked over the girls with blatant appreciation and she licked her lips, gaze meeting Brooke's for a moment. "Not yet anyways." Sam's fingers pinched at the bridge of her nose.

"I feel like I just stepped into the Twilight Zone." She muttered to herself.

"You **both** defy the laws of logic!" Sappho fumed, engines still running at full, thoroughly annoyed speed. "You are smart, beautiful young women who have absolutely no idea what is going on around them. Open your eyes! Before you miss your chance completely." Tongue pressed firmly into her cheek and feeling well and truly scolded, Sam turned away from Sappho and back in Brooke's direction, but she didn't meet the blonde's hazel eyes just yet. Heart hammering too fast in her chest, distracting her.

"Sam?" The hushed word reached her through the invisible, thrumming waves of music, gently lifting her chin until she was looking at Brooke. And it was insane. They were in the middle of a busy strip club, eyes of the female patrons and employees alike probably watching them, but Sam finally met the blonde's gaze and found it hesitant, vulnerable, yet hopeful, and despite everything the very definition of 'a moment' fell over them. Sam was sure that, had they been in some romantic comedy, everything except the two of them would have slowed, and the typical clichéd strip club music would have seamless transformed into something magical and almost guaranteed to make your arm hair stand on end. But that didn't quite happen. Sam felt a sudden rush of vertigo almost topple her and she gripped the back of a nearby chair, as her stomach exploded with an influx of butterflies. Her autopilot response was, as always, to fire back an argumentative remark, provoke Brooke, but she managed to reign the urge in.

Because Sappho was right. If she didn't something now, the chance would be gone. Probably forever.

"This is most definitely **not** how I wanted this to happen, but it's kind of fitting right?" Sam rolled her eyes, attempting an unaffected smile and failing. "I mean, everything else to do with our lives is completely dysfunctional, so it kind of makes sense to have what should be an emotional confession take place in an adult night club while we're surrounded by half naked women." Brooke's lips quirked at the corners and Sam felt her spirits life along with them, but her eyebrows furrowed with her next words. "I shouldn't have said those things. I saw you two together and I wasn't even going to come over. I was so angry, I was just going to leave. But then…" Sam paused, absently gnawing on her lower lip, and Brooke let herself quietly release the shaky breath she'd been holding. "It looked like she was going to kiss you. And something inside me just snapped." The brunette admitted in a rush, eyes darting to the side as if trying to catch a glimpse of Rose in her peripheral vision.

"So, you **were** jealous?" Once again, Sam's autopilot response revved its engines, but when her eyes slid back to Brooke's, the blonde's smile was wider, teasing, and Sam felt all the fight leave her. She grinned, almost shyly, and prodded the inside of her cheek with her tongue.

"Yeah." And then she paused for dramatic effect. "And you wanted me to be."

"Yeah, I did." Brooke admitted, and then things fell silent. Completely silent. Nervously, Brooke's eyes darted around the room and found all eyes on them. Literally every pair of eyes in the room. The music had stopped, the strippers had ceased disrobing in the middle of their acts and were leaning against their poles or patrons, and the only thing moving was the light as it danced across the shiny backdrop of the stage.

"What in the Sam Hill are y'all just standin' there for?" Rose's sudden question made Brooke jump as it broke the silence. "We're all waitin', give us a show already." When they still both did nothing but stand there, Sappho spoke up again.

"You've landed a catch. Reel her in." And finally, **finally**, Sam made a move. With a laugh that was the embodiment of a bird being freed from its cage, her left hand bridged the gap between them and grasped both ends of the feather boa still draped around Brooke's neck. It seemed to take no time at all, Sam's arm retracted in a tug that brought the blonde close enough for their hips to touch. For Brooke's arms to slide around the shorter girl and press them flush together for the first time, until they were breathing the same air. For Sam to reach up and sweep the hat from Brooke's head. Close enough that when Sam giggled nervously, Brooke felt it. And when their lips were almost touching, it felt like they already were. But when they did, that previous feeling was obliterated. Sam was dully aware of Brooke's fingers digging into the small of her back and the fireworks it sent rocketing up along her spine to explode behind her closed eyelids. The same noise was pulled from both of them in a moment of intimate synchronicity as they lost themselves, Sam's impatience pushing the kiss into deeper territory when Brooke gently nipped the reporter's lip. Reflexively, Sam's fingers clenched, clutching at the boa and the front of the blonde's shirt.

"Careful, darlin'." Rose's voice broke through the bubble they'd been standing in, allowing sound to filter back through. People were yelling, there were catcalls and wolf whistles, someone was laughing. They pulled apart, albeit reluctantly and a glance over her shoulder told Sam that the tinkling sound was coming from the cowgirl. "Y'all already gave us the show of the year, and you did it without takin' off a stitch, let's keep it that way, huh?"

And that was fine. Because that was what bedrooms, closed doors, and private shows were for.


End file.
